Thresh, the permit answersare with these guys. The telephone numbers and email addresses are found within the below link, and there is a main email located at the bottom of the their web page.
If anyone speaks Spanish and has a favorable rate international calling plan, perhaps DINAMI can explain what their problems are and why the ministry is failing to provide what business refers to as "quick hits." In other words some permits, like the small explorers should be dealt with quickly, because they are no brainers and important to the long-term success of mining in Ecuador as they feed the larger projects.
Ecuador wants to concentrate on the larger projects but they should be advancing everything. They could issue dozens of permits per week if they put their minds to it.
The fact that DINAMI failed to update its site with the 2009 Mining Law speaks volumes!
If anyone writes it might be best to translate the query into Spanish (Latin American) preferably along with your original questions/concerns/comments as there's no telling if the recipient understand French, German, etc.
https://www.mineriaecuador.com/Paginas/estructura.html
(easy translation site,
https://www.freetranslation.com/)